Would love to get your comments and weigh-in here. I used to be a big proponent of uploading creative and ministry-oriented videos to YouTube. I’m a little more cautious now after talking with several staff and reading about someone’s copyright conundrum with YouTube.
Here’s what I like about hosting a video at YouTube:
- free hosting
- tags and comments (it’s a video blog)
- exposure!
- syndication (embed codes to put on other websites)
I think this model really lends to great opportunity for Christian world-view videos to be seen, shared, and start conversations. Because of the syndication model, the conversation and marketing isn’t limited to the YouTube domain. Anyone can use that video to start a conversation on their own domain. You may not be able to control every conversation started by the video, but you can certainly start it in multiple places!
But I was re-reading the Terms of Use and saw what others are concerned about. Most likely, it’s this part (Section 6.c. under “Your User Submissions and Conduct”):
For clarity, you retain all of your ownership rights in your User Submissions. However, by submitting User Submissions to YouTube, you hereby grant YouTube a worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free, sublicenseable and transferable license to use, reproduce, distribute, prepare derivative works of, display, and perform the User Submissions in connection with the YouTube Website and YouTube’s (and its successors’ and affiliates’) business, including without limitation for promoting and redistributing part or all of the YouTube Website (and derivative works thereof) in any media formats and through any media channels. You also hereby grant each user of the YouTube Website a non-exclusive license to access your User Submissions through the Website, and to use, reproduce, distribute, display and perform such User Submissions as permitted through the functionality of the Website and under these Terms of Service. The above licenses granted by you in User Videos terminate within a commercially reasonable time after you remove or delete your User Videos from the YouTube Service. You understand and agree, however, that YouTube may retain, but not display, distribute, or perform, server copies of User Submissions that have been removed or deleted. The above licenses granted by you in User Comments are perpetual and irrevocable.
(bold added by me for emphasis)
That sounds like a lot, but if I read it correctly (or just read what I put in bold), it says that YouTube has the right, among other rights, to take your video, change it, and distribute it as they see fit.
How often does this happen? What’s the likelihood that it will? I don’t know, but it is possible.
So obviously hosting your videos yourself gets around this. You control all of the copyrights. But my encouragement would be to somehow still be able to do some of the same advantages YouTube gives. For example, allow syndication (embedding) of your video so others can do your marketing and conversation starting for you elsewhere.
Maybe the best rule of thumb is if the content of the video needs to be protected, host it yourself. If it has less production value to it, YouTube it.
What are your thoughts on this? And how difficult is it to host a video and make it syndicatable?
6 Responses to “Videos: YouTube it or Host it Yourself?”
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This is my off the cuff answer—I think it helps to know exactly what your intended destination is in terms of use. If you’re planning on making money off it, then maybe just put a clip on youtube and say “For the full version, visit etc.” But for many of us, we want to make videos that get a point across, and we want people to see it. the fear that someone will spread it without me knowing, or tamper with it (unlikely, I know) or copy the idea (I wasn’t planning on making money on it) seems negligible. We did some short films with our Media Training in January, and one of our guys put ours on Youtube. It’s really cool to know anyone (supporters, friends, professionals, clients *wink*) can watch it any time they want. If someone wants to do any of the above things, well, I don’t need to know about it. and it doesn’t bother me.
What I suggest is hosting on one of the new Christian “YouTube” sites. zigvid.com is a new Christian/family-friendly video sharing website, where are content is pre-screened (including comments) and to ensure a safe, clean environment. This way you can enjoy free video hosting, embedding capabilities AND maintain the integrity of your content and community.
Even a casual glance at YouTube would let you know that once posted, anything goes, regardless of the Terms and Conditions. So if you care about controlling your content, YouTube is not the place to post it.
I would say for large churches and ministries it is best to keep most of their content off of You Tube because of the terms of use policy. However, I would suggest putting up video trailers, promos or viral films that will create awareness of a resources, ministry strategy, etc.
The trick of YouTube (and Google Video) are the copyright description, as you put in bold. So, be sure you’re not violating the rights of the video’s you put on the web. If they’re yourselves, no problem if you decide so. But if you’re publishing films from your organization, you have two sides to prove you’re not violating the rights.
I’m not promoting the “Christian alternatives” if you have any ministry purposes. In the Netherlands we’ve tested “60 seconds video’s” with 60 seconds testimonials. These are really for on YouTube, because of the opportunity to comment, also post feedback movies, re-use on weblogs, websites, etc.
Our biggest challenge is use free available technology in a proper and innovative way. The same thought fit on social networks. The question is: “do you want to integrate or to isolate.”
Is there anyone who knows something about the “professional account” on YouTube? There are some video’s without YouTube logo on it. Maybe there are solutions for the copyright issue in an account like this.
Greetings from the Netherlands!
So glad you brought this to light.
I’ve noticed several people, like worship cafe, will host for a short time, embed to their site, then pull the videos back off as they begin to get a lot of youTube traffic (past the dates of their hosting interviews with musicians). We should probably just not leave things up long term in those cases, similarly.
Also, Chrisi, what you propose may work for blogger, but wordpress limits hosting services you can embed to youTube, google video, and perhaps one other…all similar terms I would imagine. The only thing you can do is “link to” your video, which isn’t as pretty, but may serve use for these situations.
Maggie